The American writer David Foster Wallace (1962-2008) once said that he wanted his work to make " ... more The American writer David Foster Wallace (1962-2008) once said that he wanted his work to make " heads throb heartlike ". Since his death in 2008, Wallace has attracted an increasing amount of academic interest. In this paper, I examine unexplored ideas surrounding the use of his novels, short stories and non-fiction in the classroom.
David Foster Wallace is rightly considered one of the twentieth and twenty-first century’s most m... more David Foster Wallace is rightly considered one of the twentieth and twenty-first century’s most media-immersed of writers. Yet despite his being the co-author of a book on rap, little academic attention has been paid to the potentially rich scholastic area of Wallace and music. It is my contention that Wallace scholarship would benefit immeasurably from exploring more closely the author’s relationship to this media. I begin this process by interrogating Wallace’s problematic status as a ‘grunge’ writer. Greil Marcus’ Lipstick Traces: A Secret History of the Twentieth Century provides a matrix for an examination of the relationships between avant-garde movements such as Dada, Situationism, punk and grunge, and how these relate to Wallace’s overall project. I also attempt to reinvigorate one of the author’s lesser known and extraordinarily under-theorised texts, Signifying Rappers, and present it as one of the keys to understanding Wallace’s work, as well as his development as a writer famed for the idiosyncratic use of language. In endeavouring to begin this revitalisation, I continue and develop arguments made by Tara Morrissey and Lucas Thompson in their paper ‘“The Rare White at the Window”: A Reappraisal of Mark Costello and David Foster Wallace’s Signifying Rappers’. Finally, I conclude that this potentially fruitful new area of Wallace Studies will not only provide fresh insights into the author’s work, but also have significant ramifications for the study of literature more widely.
Organised by the Punk Scholars Network, the First International Postgraduate Symposium was an att... more Organised by the Punk Scholars Network, the First International Postgraduate Symposium was an attempt to consolidate the research that continues within this area of punk. Formed in 2011, the Punk Scholars Network (PSN) is an international Network that draws together interdisciplinary scholarly activity around the subject-matter of punk rock, and has been integral towards a number of recent academic conferences, including ‘Punk in Other Places: Transmission and Transmutation Symposium’ at Reading University, ‘No Sir, I Won’t: Reconsidering the Legacy of Crass and Anarcho-Punk Symposium’ and Oxford Brookes University and the forthcoming ‘Punk and Transgression Symposium’ at De Montfort University in 2015. The Network also has a panel on the 2015 ‘Keep is Simple, Make it Fast! Crossing Borders of Underground Music Scenes Conference,’ perhaps one of the largest punk/underground academic events in the world.
Although the PSN is aware of the academic reputation of publishing post-doctoral work, it also recognises the importance that postgraduate research has in keeping research in this area relevant. Therefore, the First International Postgraduate Symposium was a means of bringing together an international array of scholars who are currently researching and writing in this area. The central task of this work, therefore, is to provide a space for postgraduates to publish work that is on going but is also of a high academic standard. More specifically, each chapter adopts an essentially analytical perspective so as to raise questions initially over the international punk scene, including its form, structure and cultural significance.
The American writer David Foster Wallace (1962-2008) once said that he wanted his work to make " ... more The American writer David Foster Wallace (1962-2008) once said that he wanted his work to make " heads throb heartlike ". Since his death in 2008, Wallace has attracted an increasing amount of academic interest. In this paper, I examine unexplored ideas surrounding the use of his novels, short stories and non-fiction in the classroom.
David Foster Wallace is rightly considered one of the twentieth and twenty-first century’s most m... more David Foster Wallace is rightly considered one of the twentieth and twenty-first century’s most media-immersed of writers. Yet despite his being the co-author of a book on rap, little academic attention has been paid to the potentially rich scholastic area of Wallace and music. It is my contention that Wallace scholarship would benefit immeasurably from exploring more closely the author’s relationship to this media. I begin this process by interrogating Wallace’s problematic status as a ‘grunge’ writer. Greil Marcus’ Lipstick Traces: A Secret History of the Twentieth Century provides a matrix for an examination of the relationships between avant-garde movements such as Dada, Situationism, punk and grunge, and how these relate to Wallace’s overall project. I also attempt to reinvigorate one of the author’s lesser known and extraordinarily under-theorised texts, Signifying Rappers, and present it as one of the keys to understanding Wallace’s work, as well as his development as a writer famed for the idiosyncratic use of language. In endeavouring to begin this revitalisation, I continue and develop arguments made by Tara Morrissey and Lucas Thompson in their paper ‘“The Rare White at the Window”: A Reappraisal of Mark Costello and David Foster Wallace’s Signifying Rappers’. Finally, I conclude that this potentially fruitful new area of Wallace Studies will not only provide fresh insights into the author’s work, but also have significant ramifications for the study of literature more widely.
Organised by the Punk Scholars Network, the First International Postgraduate Symposium was an att... more Organised by the Punk Scholars Network, the First International Postgraduate Symposium was an attempt to consolidate the research that continues within this area of punk. Formed in 2011, the Punk Scholars Network (PSN) is an international Network that draws together interdisciplinary scholarly activity around the subject-matter of punk rock, and has been integral towards a number of recent academic conferences, including ‘Punk in Other Places: Transmission and Transmutation Symposium’ at Reading University, ‘No Sir, I Won’t: Reconsidering the Legacy of Crass and Anarcho-Punk Symposium’ and Oxford Brookes University and the forthcoming ‘Punk and Transgression Symposium’ at De Montfort University in 2015. The Network also has a panel on the 2015 ‘Keep is Simple, Make it Fast! Crossing Borders of Underground Music Scenes Conference,’ perhaps one of the largest punk/underground academic events in the world.
Although the PSN is aware of the academic reputation of publishing post-doctoral work, it also recognises the importance that postgraduate research has in keeping research in this area relevant. Therefore, the First International Postgraduate Symposium was a means of bringing together an international array of scholars who are currently researching and writing in this area. The central task of this work, therefore, is to provide a space for postgraduates to publish work that is on going but is also of a high academic standard. More specifically, each chapter adopts an essentially analytical perspective so as to raise questions initially over the international punk scene, including its form, structure and cultural significance.
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Although the PSN is aware of the academic reputation of publishing post-doctoral work, it also recognises the importance that postgraduate research has in keeping research in this area relevant. Therefore, the First International Postgraduate Symposium was a means of bringing together an international array of scholars who are currently researching and writing in this area. The central task of this work, therefore, is to provide a space for postgraduates to publish work that is on going but is also of a high academic standard. More specifically, each chapter adopts an essentially analytical perspective so as to raise questions initially over the international punk scene, including its form, structure and cultural significance.
Although the PSN is aware of the academic reputation of publishing post-doctoral work, it also recognises the importance that postgraduate research has in keeping research in this area relevant. Therefore, the First International Postgraduate Symposium was a means of bringing together an international array of scholars who are currently researching and writing in this area. The central task of this work, therefore, is to provide a space for postgraduates to publish work that is on going but is also of a high academic standard. More specifically, each chapter adopts an essentially analytical perspective so as to raise questions initially over the international punk scene, including its form, structure and cultural significance.